


I spin, I spiral, and I splatter

by swallowedsong (bookstvnerdlove)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-08
Updated: 2015-04-08
Packaged: 2018-03-21 22:45:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3706601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookstvnerdlove/pseuds/swallowedsong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>90s college au (because I’m a sucker for that setting)<br/>captain swan with hints of gremma and tinkerhook (and none of it tied neat in a bow at the end)</p>
            </blockquote>





	I spin, I spiral, and I splatter

 

Emma doesn't know which fact makes her feel worse.

One, that Graham’s arms are around her and he’s whispering in her ear to have a good night - and all she can see is Killian’s burning stare from across the hallway. (And that she’s staring at him over Graham’s shoulder and she has no clue if the shiver that she feels travel down her spine is from that scrape of Graham’s scruff at her neck. Or from blue eyes she can’t seem to escape.)

Or two, that Emma knows, deep down, Tink is upstairs and waiting for Killian to stop being an ass and realize that  _she_  thinks they are on a date. (Even if  _he_  clearly doesn’t.) 

* * *

 

Shame is a funny thing, the way it curls around her heart and squeezes, the way it makes her flush in anger, in frustration. 

The way it makes her heart beat faster when  _he_  is in her space. 

(Even though she hopes he never knows how much he makes her  _feel.)_

* * *

 

When Graham’s lips brush against her cheek she murmurs a  _goodnight_  back to him. His lips linger near her skin and she knows that if she shifted just an inch, the turn of her head, an acknowledgement that he’s still there, his lips would be on hers.

She’s kissed him before, so it’s not like she can’t imagine how he’ll feel against her, how the pressure of his lips might make her heart beat faster. It happened at a party just like this one, his lips sweet from the whiskey. She’d leaned across the bar in Ruby’s kitchen and she’d brushed her lips against his and pulled away before the shock of it wore off and either of them was tempted to make it something  _more_. 

But that had been two months ago since then, he’s called her and they've spent hours talking. Talking entire nights away, the pitch dark night brightening into day. And still there’s been nothing else.

(And she can’t tell what in the world is supposed to happen next.)

* * *

 

_The first time she met Killian Jones, she was drunk, jumping and dancing on Jefferson’s bed to the loud angry beats of Alice in Chains._

_They were commiserating his recent split with (funnily enough) Alice, and he’d called her, voice slurring over the phone, begging until she promised she’d come over and they could exorcise her from his mind._

_“Cyrus,” Jeff was shouting,  his voice hoarse from the booze and the singing. “She left me for some wanker named Cyrus.”  
_

_As Emma had been about to respond, she’d heard an accented voice from the doorway, “Oi, mate. Stop stealing my slang and get your own. Wanker.”_

_She hadn’t been expecting company and it made Emma startle, enough that she fell directly off the bed and onto the hardwood floor of Jeff’s apartment. Her heart had been pounding and she’d never known for sure if it was the booze, the dancing, the fall, or the blue blue eyes of Killian Jones._

* * *

 

She hates feeling out of control, so when Killian calls her name after Graham leaves, she walks into the rec room on the ground floor of David’s apartment complex and picks up a pool cue. She challenges him to a quick game of 9-Ball and merely arches a brow when he tries to tease her about Graham’s tame goodbye. 

“You can trash talk him all you want if it makes you feel better,  _Jones._ But  _I’m_  the one who’s gonna wipe the table with your ass.”

She says it with a smile, so that he can’t see how much his comments dig into her, tiny sharp pinpricks in her skin, that makes her want better for both of them than this  _dance_  of theirs. 

“Game on,  _Swan,”_ he smiles with bared teeth, a sarcastic tilt to his head. 

(He’s no fool. He knows, and she just has to live with it.)

* * *

 

_The first time Emma kissed Killian Jones, they were at a Smashing Pumpkins concert, thrashing their heads in the middle of the crowd, with tickets acquired by Jefferson, only to arrive at his apartment to find an envelope taped to his door with their names on it._

_Their eyes met at just the right time, when the band was shifting from one song to another and suddenly his hands were in her hair and he was pulling her body towards him._

_Two weeks later, she was still riding high on the press of his lips against hers, the way he’d moaned her name, the way his hips ground into hers. Two weeks of bliss and angst until Jeff pulled her aside and said, “You know he’s the guy that Tink keeps going on and on about,” bursting her bubble._

* * *

 

One game turns into best-out-of-three because she does exactly what she said she’d do. She systematically knocked ball after ball into the pocket before he even had a turn. 

“This is war,” Killian had said as he rolled up his sleeves. He’d poured them shots of whiskey and he’d turned up the heavy metal wailing through the speakers. 

“Fine,” she’d replied, nodding at the cue in his hands, “I’ll even give you a chance this time.”

“How generous, darling,” he says, his accent getting thicker the more and more he drinks, the closer their bodies come to brushing against each other as she shifts out of his way. 

She leans down to set the balls in the rack and his eyes flicker down to her shirt, the stretched crew neck of her favorite concert tee gaping low. She should straighten her back just an inch, enough to bring the fabric back to her chest, but his eyes widen, darken, and his tongue darts out to lick his lips. 

(She’s thankful her clothes hide most of the blush that spreads across her body.)

* * *

 

_The first time Emma slept with Killian Jones, he pulled her into the dark room, where he had been developing photos from_ The Concert _._

_It had been six weeks since that night. One month since Jeff had warned her away._

_And she’d done what she needed to do, even though Tink was more Ruby’s friend than Emma’s. Even though Ruby assured her that regardless of what everybody thought, Killian was free to kiss her (or any other girl he wanted)._

_She’d found a new route to her pottery class, she learned how to avoid his dorm on the way to caf for lunch. She was doing The Right Thing._

_“I’m not playing seven minutes in heaven with you, Jones,” she’d said as his hands moved down her arms, before finding her waist.  
_

_He’d pulled her body towards his and he’d murmured, “How about five then, love?”_

_It felt so wrong, her heart racing as she leaned into him, her head tilting back so she could see his lips, how he nervously tugged at his lower lip with his teeth, wondering how it would feel if he did that to her._

_It felt wrong and delicious as she whispered, “yes” and his hands lifted her to the table. It felt wrong and perfect as he knelt between her legs and sent her over the edge with lips and tongue and teeth. It felt wrong and yet it was also everything as his teeth scraped against her neck when he came._

* * *

 

“So, you gonna tell me why you’re hiding down here, spying on me instead of up with Tink?” She asks him after he sinks the last ball on the table and ties up their game. 

She’s pouting about the loss and she can’t help but fall into this dangerous pattern of theirs.  _He started it_ , she rationalizes with herself,  _prying about Graham when he should have left well enough alone._

But she knows that it’s just an excuse. That the real reason they pick and snipe at each other is cover for something more. 

“Tink knows the score.”

“Does she, Killian? Because I’m pretty sure she’s upstairs, drinking her way through a bottle of rum because you’d rather spend time down here - alone - than with her.”

He has enough grace to look ashamed at that, his body stiffening at the truth of the statement. But still, he catches her gaze and he holds it as he takes several steps towards her, his voice softly enunciating each word as he replies, “We did nothing wrong, Emma.”

(And maybe neither of them are responsible for what Tink wants, but aren't they supposed to better than this?) 

(She doesn't know what the truth is anymore.)

* * *

 

She wins the third game in silence, but it takes twice as long as the first two. They play to make each other blush, with flashes of skin and his arm brushing against hers. They play with intense stares and Emma’s body shakes with nerves as he watches her line up shot after shot. They play a dangerous game and Emma knows that when it’s over, she’s going to have to decide. Decide if she’s ready to admit that they are both free to make this choice. 

Or she can stay constrained within the world of  _shoulds_  and  _oughts_. 

And when it’s finally over, she pours them each one last shot, the burn of the alcohol giving her reprieve from his expectation. 

He turns to leave, and she turns away from him, because she knows that if she watches him go, she’ll say  _yes._ She’ll say  _fuck it all_  and she’ll throw caution to the wind. She’ll tell him to stay. 

And she’s not ready yet. 

She hears a strangled “Emma” and “Please” before she hears a sigh and the quiet click of the door closing behind him.

(That’s when she lets herself cry.)

 


End file.
